13 Best Products To Buy At A Middle Eastern Grocery Store

There's an endless array of incredible Middle Eastern ingredients and foods, but you won't find many of them at the average U.S. grocery store. Even if you do, the items aren't always the best representatives of the region's ingredients or dishes. When you're looking for genuine variety and authenticity, your best bet is to visit a Middle Eastern grocery store instead.

Growing up as an Egyptian immigrant, my family and I often sought out Middle Eastern grocery stores that offered a wide range of authentic regional food products. There are so many goodies to find and enhance your pantry from these specialty stores, including spices, condiments, coffees, and more. Many Middle Eastern grocery stores have a refrigerated or frozen section, too, and some even offer homemade treats, snacks, and prepared foods, as well. Now, while my family had to occasionally travel to another city to track down our favorite comfort items in the past, there's much more access to Middle Eastern food in the 2020s.

If you're wondering which food items are worth seeking out from the nearest specialty store, I've got the answers. Between my personal experience and professional expertise as a recipe developer and food writer, I'm extremely well-acquainted with which Middle Eastern food items are worth purchasing from these stores. Here are the best (and some of my personal go-to) products to buy at a Middle Eastern grocery store.

If you're wondering what pomegranate molasses is, well, it's exactly what it sounds like. This ruby red liquid is fruity, tart, a tiny bit sweet, and can add just enough brightness to lift any dish to new heights. Different brands may have different recipes, but at its heart, it's a concentration of pomegranate juice and sugar that's been cooked down to a syrup. Since pomegranates are a notoriously tricky fruit to prepare, most people prefer to buy their pomegranate molasses ready-made.

Pomegranate molasses is a pantry staple in the Middle East, and its various uses in regional cuisine highlight its versatility. It's the main salad dressing ingredient for many vinaigrettes, used in meat dishes, dips, and in sausages, as well. Perhaps it's surprising that pomegranate molasses is mainly used in savory dishes, but it truly works well and often adds the right balance. You can find it at any Middle Eastern grocery store, with varying degrees of sweetness and natural ingredients. You can use this Middle Eastern product to glaze salmon or in exciting cocktails like a pomegranate gin fizz.

One aspect of Middle Eastern cuisine that's widely known is how spice-rich it is. Most dishes — whether savory or sweet — are spiced and seasoned in ways that range from subtle to pungent. While warmer spices (such as cinnamon, coriander, cumin, and cardamom) are more well-known, the surprisingly tart and bright red-hued spice called sumac is just as important.

Though it's been gaining popularity in Western kitchens, sumac has been loved across West Asia, Turkey, and Iran since ancient times. It comes from the berry of the sumac plant, which is dried and ground to a powder — hence its deep crimson color and fruity, sour taste. You might know it as one of the components of za'atar, but on its own, the spice has a wonderful flavor worthy of being the center of attention.

Sumac is often sprinkled on salads, dips, and rice, and can be used to season grilled chicken or fish. You can also make it a part of your avocado toast lunch, add it to your yogurt, or even use the vibrant spice to give shortbread cookies a tart bite.

From North Africa to West Asia, there's rarely a table spread without a plate of pickled vegetables. Though these pickles are merely a side character to the main course, they're as ubiquitous (and important) as any other dish. Coming in a variety of colors and flavors, Middle Eastern pickled vegetables are often used to break through a fatty meal or wrapped in shawarma for a hit of crunchy sharpness. Since you're unlikely to ever see these types of pickled vegetables in a mainstream supermarket, it's worth buying them from a Middle Eastern grocery store.

One of the best kept secrets of Middle Eastern cuisine, there are so many pickled vegetable variations. They're crispier and saltier than average pickles, and sometimes spicier, too. You can find anything from pickled turnips, carrots, cabbages, chiles, olives, cucumbers, cauliflower, onions, and even lemons. You can find jars with an assortment of pickles, as well.

If you cook and bake with sesame seeds, it's useful to buy a larger amount than the tiny jars or packets sold at most grocery stores. Considering how integral sesame seeds are to many Middle Eastern dishes, you can often find bigger batches of them at specialty grocery stores — and usually at lower prices.

Sesame seeds generally keep for a long time, but to keep them extra fresh, you can keep them in your freezer. Of course, another sesame seed product that you can find for a good price at Middle Eastern grocery stores is tahini — AKA pure sesame seed paste sold in various sizes and brands. You'll likely find tahini sold at regular stores with added ingredients, but this won't be as tasty as an authentic version. Given this, it's best to go for a jar containing just sesame seed paste from a specialty location, then mix your own sauces at home.

You can buy this nutty ingredient and use it as the base for all types of sauces and dressings. Tahini can make anything creamy without the need for dairy, too; try some in your next banana smoothie and taste how luscious it can be.

You may find yourself in the spice section of a Middle Eastern grocery store for longer than intended. After all, the blends and aromas will likely make you want to investigate them all. I particularly seek out chile and pepper spices because there's usually more variety than just one or two non-descript "chile powder" or "pepper spice" options. You'll find spices like Turkish urfa biber at Middle Eastern stores, as well as Aleppo pepper, which is worth buying when you're there.

Aleppo pepper is sometimes labeled halaby pepper — "halab" means Aleppo in Arabic — and is named after Aleppo, Syria (where this style of pepper originates). Aleppo pepper is different from regular chile flakes in that it's not as hot, with fruity and smoky undertones that make it a flavor enhancer. Since Aleppo pepper is just as integral as salt and pepper in some parts of the Middle East, you'll always find it at a specialty grocery store.

Ghee — or "samna" as it's known in Arabic — is essential in Middle Eastern cuisine. It's not an ingredient you just swap out for butter or oil, either, since its flavor is often what an entire dish is built on. From sweet bakes to savory dishes, there are so many great ways to use ghee. It's a useful ingredient to keep in your kitchen for any type of cuisine and instantly enhances your cooking with a richer, more intensely buttery flavor — meaning it's worth buying from Middle Eastern grocery stores.

This clarified butter is possible to make yourself, and my family used to make our own ghee because we couldn't find it in stores. However, when we did manage to find ghee at a Middle Eastern grocery store, it was a must buy to save ourselves the trouble of the making it at home. Stores often stock different brands of ghee, and can be found in large bulk tins, as well as smaller cans if you just want to give it a try first.